How to get Aspie husband to see he has AS

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I didn't realize compulsive lying was part of As diagnosis. Interesting. Are you lying now?[/quote]

Actually compulsive lying ISN'T a feature of aspergers. We're usually less able to lie.

I'm stressing usually because there are cases where we can lie very convincingly but it takes a lot of effort.

If your husband is lying constantly, it's either because
a. You have him trapped in a place where he's forced to do so
b. There's more to it than just aspergers.

I'm stressing usually because there are cases where we can lie very convincingly but it takes a lot of effort.

If your husband is lying constantly, it's either because
a. You have him trapped in a place where he's forced to do so
b. There's more to it than just aspergers.[/quote]


A.

I enjoyed reading your marriage encounter blog entries. I'm still reading other entries.

Again, glad I could help. It was nearly impossible for me to explain myself in the past, or even really understand myself to be able to explain in any meaningful detail. Once I met my wife and we went through the various issues together (arguing, mostly) she began to figure out how to get me past the defensive part and to the introspective parts. She says it was really difficult for her (and still can be) but by not pushing my buttons and letting me recenter a bit we can get to the point where we can have an open discussion and I can actually start to unravel my thoughts and get some epiphanies and revelations going. It's not always easy since I can ramble along and say weird things (or in a weird way) but she has also gotten better at not reacting to those and taking thing more literally than trying to read emotions out of what I say or how I say them. But without all that hard work of hers I wouldn't be at the level of understanding myself that I am at, I would have kept pushing it down and feeling like it was wrong or like nobody would understand it or they would think I was weird. So if my articulating what he apparently feels, but has trouble explaining or expressing, opens up your dialogue I am sure you will both be on the path to feeling better. If he can start to feel like you'll understand even if he isn't completely making sense then he'll be much more comfortable and less upset about not being able to explain, which will help his frustration bucket be more empty all the time, and let him cope with the frustrations he has to deal with and even begin to accept minor failures more easily. I stopped calling them failures and call them errors instead, and as simplistic as that sounds it seems to help. I can make errors, but I can't fail. I just takes a little of the negative connotation and sort of guilt feel off of the thought and makes it easier to process without all the fear.

Quite possible. Lots of times we're both tired/stressed at the same times which makes talking about much of anything more difficult, since my wife has less patience for dealing with my quirks yet I'm too tired to keep them down as much, it's like a double whammy. But now I can realize that and apologize for being tired (which she knows means I'm less capable of reducing my issues, yet I don't have to verbosely admit to that every time which as you might guess = failure to me) and at the same time I try harder to control my reflexes, maybe even just sit and meditate for a minute to calm down, and that seems to help quite a bit.

We have lots of issues with driving as well. My wife's transmission conked out last winter so we've been down to one car, and it's an older one with plenty of quirks (just like me! lol) so she doesn't feel comfortable driving it. We commonly have problems where she perceives that I'm not paying attention and she gets a good dose of anxiety, or even closer to panic sometimes, similar to how I'm sure you feel when you say he might not notice a red light or the like. However I am constantly paying attention, probably more than most people do, it's just that I can keep track of things even when I'm not directly looking at them. I have already observed what's happening about half a mile ahead whenever possible, I generally know if a light has been green for a while that it will likely turn soon, such as before I get to it, so I plan ahead to pay closer attention as we approach. I keep a mental picture of all the cars and trucks in front of me so I even pretty much know where I will need to slow down or stop way ahead of time. I can understand how it must appear when I seem to space out or it looks like I'm looking at something else but it's usually just because driving can be a bit stressful. If there is any time during the day where failure is certainly not an option, it's when I'm driving, and there are hundreds of possible failures popping up all over the place the whole time. I actually space out in order to pay better attention - I know that sounds ridiculous and counterintuitive and doesn't make any sense at all, but if I didn't do that at least from time to time where appropriate (where less is going on, like on longer stretches with less intersections and etc) I would freak out and maybe even have to pull over and wouldn't be able to drive at all - or at the very least I actually would appear to be paying attention but would miss things. I do not stop paying attention when my eyes go glassy or when I'm looking at a passing cloud or bird or whatever, I am just calming my nerves a bit by distracting the parts of my brain that aren't currently in use. Sort of like whistling or biting nails when nervous. I can completely understand how it looks, but I still get a little hurt when my wife doesn't place her entire trust in me. I try hard not to have an outward appearance like I'm daydreaming or getting lost in the clouds but it doesn't always work. I also try to react less to her anxieties and not take them as a direct attack on my skills as an automobile pilot. But I at least wonder if your husband has a similar take on driving, like the silent and hidden extra observation of things well in advance and all. Has he ever actually been in an accident at any time in his whole driving record?

Sure. I (and my wife, who's reading along now) love to help.

My wife says she has a couple tips for you from her point of view (I also added my own tidbits to better clarify how what she does helps me)...

Try to express your feelings in a more verbose method. Tell him how you feel with more words, and don't expect him to pick up on nonverbal signs or other cues. Also explain it in a way that can't be taken as placing fault, for example less like "you make me feel nervous" and a bit more like "when you do whatever, it makes me feel nervous" - that way it won't trigger as much of a personal defense and he can more easily see that it was because of him doing whatever that you felt nervous. I know that seems a bit obvious and normally "you make me feel nervous" actually means the more lengthy version, and a neurotypical person would connect the most obvious previous action to being the cause, but it's really more of a mystery to us. With the extra words it really helps.

Also along the same lines, she says my inputs from above are accurate but I didn't clearly enough state that these methods should only be used temporarily. In other words just to alleviate some of his backlog of bundled up issues to get communications going more smoothly, and build his trust that you can understand his weird thoughts so he can share them with you, and then mix it up a little with more "normal nagging" (her words) so he can get more used to that. Another way to put it is once you've become a team working together against the AS issues, it will be possible to use more normal urging and communication, without it being processed as an attack or an additional noisy input he has to process.

I fit that description. I probably couldn't lie to save my life. In fact I have sometimes had a hard time convincing people I'm telling the truth when I'm telling the truth. However, I certainly am not incapable of deceit. I may not be able to directly lie convincingly when questioned, but I can often dodge the question for example.

Let's see. There's deliberate lying - where I'm laying false trails deliberately to create a false impression

There's lying by omission - where what you don't know won't hurt you

There's lying because it never occurred to me you'd be interested in knowing that

There's the normal "intelligence is being able to maintain several inconsistent logical universes at once" sort of lying

Part of the stress for aspies, being - as we are - a little closer to the text of our relationships and a little farther away from the sense of them, comes from the difficulties of assessing the disclose / don't disclose risk structures of our lives and choosing effective patterns of action based on that assessment. In my experience, normals don't have anything like the same sorts of problems. They just do or say whatever their damned theory of mind tells them to, and assume everything will be alright.

Or am I missing the point, again?

Easy, the same way one gets any man to realize he's not a god.

Am I the only one who is horribly distressed by this description? He drugs you, against your will?! That is so outrageous! A person cannot trick their spouse into ingesting medication against their will. That has to be illegal. And he's endangering the health (or even life?) of his own child? That has to be put to a stop!



Why do you feel like his behavior is your fault? Is it because he blames you? Do your blame yourself?



Does that even matter? It doesn't really matter whether he is placating you and the therapist in order to break rules, or if he has some erroneous thought processes where he intends to follow through but for whatever reason does not.



This is what people in abusive relationships say.

Frankly, I am of the opinion that it doesn't matter whether he is choosing to lie and cheat, or whether he is unable to keep his promises. He is endangering your health and the health of your child. The therapy is not working. You are still in danger. He medicates you against your will, and exposes your child to stuff that could sicken (or kill?) him. Frankly, I would strongly consider getting a restraining order against him for you and your child.

Don't let his emotional manipulation stop you from protecting yourself and your child. This is NOT your fault. It may not even be his fault. But whether or not it is his fault is irrelevant: you must protect yourself, you must protect your child. Please don't wait another day. I honestly would be concerned that he might escalate if you tip him off. Please keep us posted.

Last edited by sg33 on 20 Aug 2009, 10:38 am, edited 2 times in total.

I agree Sg33. When people do things like that there are consequences. We don't explain them away. I don't buy this argument that this behavior is somehow uncontrollable by the person with AS. I think it's all emotional bullying.

http://www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/dsm-iv.html

That might be right. He may not have AS. People with AS have impairments in cognitive empathy and theory of mind: we have trouble figuring out what other people feel. However, we have normal empathetic concern; once we know what others feel, we care as much as NT people do. And we actually score higher on personal distress: when we observe suffering, we suffer more than NT people in similar situations do. [reference]

Susie123: The fact that he keeps harming you, blaming you, doing whatever he thinks is best (regardless of how it affects others), and refusing to change: this makes me wonder whether this isn't NPD, misdiagnosed as AS.

Susie123, while I believe it is important to get all types of input and explanation... I would also suggest taking all advice with a grain of salt since no one here has been in your exact situation. The behaviors you describe are peculiar, and seem to demand some sort of protective response - whether that is to lock away the medications as a whole, to experiment with spending time apart, or any of a number of solutions. But at the same time, be wary of extreme assumptions and perhaps look to find non-emotive arguments to the situations:

* Exposure to allegens can cause severe reactions in your child; he is responsible for making sure that does not happen.
* Use of antibiotics when not prescribed can expose you to further illness and help make some bugs more resistant.
* High doses of aspirin can have adverse affects; his attempts to force you to take medication, especially if he is not aware that you have taken it already, puts you at a health risk.

Sensationalized arguments rarely have an effect on me; it is the grist of the issue that I need to address. Be direct, be honest, be firm; do not be angry, do not invoke emotional responses, do not make it into a pleading where you lose your footing in the conversation. Take care of yourself, your child, and of him, and remember to keep your priorities.


M.

Yikes -- I must have miscomminucated. My husband is complettely aware that he is going through red lights. He's also driven dangerously fast at times. He stopped for a while after being pulled over for a warning. In these cases he, of curse, insists he has excellent jusgement, but no one does. The eyes glazing over is a different thing. He really seems to check out at times when he's in the midst of whatever it is that makes him do everything I've begged and pleaded with him not to.

Last night I asked him again about this feeling you feel when you fear you could be wrong and he no longer relates to your description or sees that he even acts that way or boastful at times. (Sigh).

Thanks -- If only I could get him to work as a team! I've never seen him as a collaboator. It's either he'll do what he wants the way he wants or he'll be a complete follower. What to do?

Wow, it really is a different way of being! Can you give me a concrete example of what you're saying? Thanks!

I tend to agree with everything you are saying, and it is the life of our child he is so lax about, so I am in charge of protecting our child 24/7, no days off. The problem is my husband acts perfectly normal when around my family, well, anyone he knows for that matter, so our families think it is me who causes him to act these ways. No one belives he has AS, despite a diagnosis, because it isn't something that's acquired. And he was so "normal" (for the most part) in the early years. His neurologist also encourages me to stay and get marriage counseling, but I think counseling is a waste of time because he won't change for more than a day. I also agree it's the cycle of abuse. My child now even says, "but Daddy was nice today when he did [xyz] for me" as of that excused all the other stuff.

I do appreciate you chiming in. It's good to hear confirmation of what I believe, even as I try to fix our broken relationship.

This is good advice. Thank you. My problem is even having doctors talk to him hasn't done any good. He still does what he wants and believes what he believes. That is why I am so perplexed. Everyone here seems to have an insight that he doesn't. I feel like he's a computer that's been programmed wrong and no matter what anyone tells him, he knows better.